Hunger
by HeroismInACan
Summary: "The girl in the full-length mirror was slim and beautiful, but, despite the truth the mirror showed her, Amelia Jones still only saw a girl that was too fat." USUK. Short Story. Completed.


**Characters:** Amelia Jones (Female America) and Arthur Kirkland (England)

**Series:** Hetalia

**Warnings:** Anorexia

**Author's Notes: **This is a rewrite of an old story I wrote back in 2012. I felt like fixing it up and posting it just for the sake of posting it.

O-O-O

The girl in the full-length mirror was slim and beautiful, but, despite the truth the mirror showed her, Amelia Jones still only saw a girl that was too fat.

Her eyes often lied to her. They made her see what she presumed people thought of her, but those people were only just teasing. They were only meant as jokes, but Amelia took them to heart after some point.

Her stomach grumbled loudly, and she quickly laid her hands upon the smooth skin as if to shush the sounds. She'd been eating less and less each day, trying to lose the pounds she thought she needed to lose, and dropping weight quickly.

She met the gaze of her reflection, but only frowned at herself.

Her arms fell back to her sides, and she turned away from the mirror and made her way to the bed. She picked up her pajama bottoms off the edge, and slipped those on along with a tank top. The girl turned to face the door just as a knock echoed through the room.

"Come in," she hollered, and watched as the knob turned.

Her older brother, Mathew, stepped into view and leaned against the doorframe. He had hair longer than his sister's and refused to get it cut.

Amelia put on a smile, but it seemed that Mathew saw right through it.

"Mom said dinners ready," he said flatly, arms crossing over his chest.

"Tell her I'm not hungry," she moved forward to shut the door, but her brother wasn't going to budge. He blocked the doorframe and stood his ground.

"Amelia," he looked her in the eyes.

"What?" she asked innocently, but she already had a feeling that she knew what he meant.

"You need to eat," he said softly, worry tinting his voice.

"I did eat. Earlier today when I had lunch. I'm still full from that," she stated, lying through her teeth.

"Ameli—"

"Leave me alone, Mathew," she cut him off and took a step backwards.

He seemed to get the picture, for he moved out of the way when the door came slamming closed.

O-O-O

Amelia roamed the halls of school the following day, her bag hanging off her shoulder as she wore a grin to mask what was hiding underneath. She said her greetings to her friends as she passed them, nodded to those who nodded first in acknowledgment, and eventually made it to her locker. She stood in front of it and dialed in her combination. She began to feel faint suddenly, and following that was minor stomach cramps. She fought through it, waiting for them to subside, and finished opening her locker. She shoved two textbooks into the cramped space and slammed the door closed before twirling, almost too quickly, on her heels. That didn't help her dizziness at all, and she regretted making such a quick movement.

As she regained her bearings, she spotted someone within a close proximity and instinctively turned to look.

Arthur Kirkland, the British kid who always wore tore up jeans and dyed his hair whacky colors, was standing three lockers down from where she stood. She could make out the words on his shirt, although she didn't recognize the band portrayed, she was _that _close to him.

Amelia, like many other girls, had a crush on him. All of her friends knew about it, and the teasing was near endless.

She didn't know what it was that attracted her to him like a magnet, but regardless she knew that she didn't stand a chance.

Arthur wasn't exactly like a typical teenage boy, or at least she figured that much. She heard him once talking about an ex-_boyfriend_. That should have been a clear sign to her that he was probably gay and she should just give up, but she couldn't.

O-O-O

Amelia felt worse when lunch came around. Sitting at the table with all her friends and trying to keep attached to the conversation was becoming a challenging task. Her hands shook and her stomach growled, and occasionally she saw someone at her table glance her way out of concern.

Walking from the lunchroom to homeroom proved to be more challenging, and not even a minute after she entered the room she had collapsed.

The teacher rushed to her side and helped her up, along with one of the other girls in the room, and she was taken to the nurse. The woman there gave her crackers and told her to remain lying down until her strength came back. There wasn't much else that could be done.

"Would you like to tell me what happened?" the nurse asked.

"I just wasn't feeling well."

"Well, make sure you eat all of those crackers and drink lots of water. That should help." The woman flashed a kind smile before retreating to her office.

Amelia turned her line of vision to the ceiling and closed her eyes. Not even a minute after doing so she heard footsteps. Her eyes snapped open and she turned her head to investigate. Her heart began to pound loudly in her chest.

Arthur Kirkland was in the room, and he was speaking to the nurse about something that she couldn't quite hear.

Amelia turned her head away quickly and resumed staring at the ceiling. She wondered why he was in here. Was it for something simple? Or was this something he did every day? More questions began to pile up in her skull, and when she, out of curiosity, turned her head to look back at him their gazes met.

He'd been staring at her.

She felt her cheeks flush and immediately turned to stare back at the much more fascinating ceiling.

She heard footsteps again followed by a voice. "You're Amelia, right?"

The girl turned her head, noticing that she didn't need to turn far. He was a lot closer now. "Yeah, that'd be me," she offered a sheepish smile.

"Hm," he nodded his head, "I don't believe we've spoken before." His accent was heavy on his tongue, but having only lived in this new country for a couple of months that was expected.

"We haven't, but I see you around the school often." She mentally cursed herself for saying that. Of course she saw him around the school often. Three lockers separated their own from each other, so any time she went to dump off books she'd usually spot him. To change the subject she quickly added, "what are you in here for?"

"Headache," Arthur pointed to his head with a crooked smile. "What about you?"

She hesitated for a long moment, considering her words carefully, "stomach ache." It wasn't an entire lie, but it wasn't the entire truth either.

Amelia wasn't sure if Arthur spotted the brief moment of hesitation or not, but either way he turned his attention to the nurse as she came walking their way. She handed him a few ibuprofen along with a paper cup of water before she returned to her office again.

He gulped down the pills and finished off the liquid before throwing the cup into a nearby trash bin. He looked back to the girl with a smile on his face. "Well, I hope you feel better, Amelia."

"Thanks, you too," she matched his smile and watched him leave. The moment he was gone she frowned. She was hoping for the conversation to last longer, but she supposed she should just be happy with the fact that he knew her name.

O-O-O

The weeks progressed at a slow rate, and Amelia found that things weren't getting any better for her. It was on a Friday when she felt particularly down, and her solution was to skip out on her last period. She disappeared behind the school to the bleachers where others were known to hide when doing the same. She was surprised to see that no one else was there.

The girl took her place on a middle row on the bleachers and rested her feet on the one below her. She rested her elbows on her knees and looked out at the grassy field, a frown on her face.

She didn't know what she was doing out here, and she didn't know why she skipped out on her class either. She just wasn't feeling up to doing anything, but being idle allowed thoughts to bubble. As she sat, she began thinking about everything. She began to feel a wetness in the corners of her eyes, and felt silly for it. Why was she crying? Was it because she thought she was fat when in truth she was underweight? Was it because that deep down she felt hideous and unwanted when in truth she was beautiful and loved? She couldn't help the way she thought. It felt like a sickness, and it gnawed at her insides.

"Hey."

Amelia jumped, startled out of her dismal bubble of self-pity and hate, and turned to look at the owner of the voice. She had been expecting to find a teacher, just because knowing her luck that would happen, but in actuality it was just Arthur.

He stood there with a cigarette in one hand, lit and trailing smoke, and the other resting in the front pocket of his torn jeans. His posture was aloof, but his eyes showed a glimmer of concern. He took a drag from the stick before allowing his gaze to dance over the girl before him.

She swallowed the forming lump in her throat and forced on a smile, "hi." She felt ill again, and her palms felt clammy.

Arthur raised a thick eyebrow, "are you all right?"

She nodded her head, "yeah, I'm fine."

He didn't look like he believed her, but he didn't say anything more. Instead, he sat beside her and snuffed out his cigarette on the seat below. "I'm surprised to see you ditching."

"And why is that?" the girl rubbed at her eyes, thankful that the tears had ceased rather quickly.

"Well, usually girls like you aren't down here. This is where all the bad kids go," he said with a smile.

She laughed out of disbelief, "and you're one of the bad kids then?" Arthur may have looked the part, but he certainly didn't give off that feeling anywhere else.

"Oh, I'm by far the worst," he nodded in affirmation.

Amelia laughed again, "sure, sure. I totally believe that."

"You'd better believe it because it's true," he said with another smile.

A brief moment of silence fell over the two before Arthur spoke up again, "if you don't mind my asking, why were you crying?"

Amelia looked at him, "I was hoping you hadn't noticed that." She tried to brush it off by laughing again, but it sounded forced. She quieted and looked at her lap. "I really don't want to talk about it. Let's just say that there are some problems going on in my life, but who doesn't have problems, right?" She looked back to the boy.

"You got a point. I got my share of problems, too." Arthur looked out at the field, contemplating something. "We all have problems now, but things usually always get better at some point. I try not to dwell on what's bad in my life. I'd rather look to the good, you know?"

Amelia agreed, but maintaining that mindset wasn't an easy task. "That's hard to do when you care about what other's think and say about you."

Arthur looked to her with one eyebrow raised, "it doesn't have to be hard though. In a couple of years what they say won't matter anyway. You're young, you're beautiful, and you have the whole world ahead of you. Don't bother caring about what some jerks think about you." He laughed lightly, "I mean, I'm a prime example. Look at me: piercings, dyed hair, torn clothes, smoking habit. I'm every mother's worst nightmare, yet I'm a good kid. People say crap about me all the time and do I look like I care?" He leaned back against the bleachers, resting his feet on the one below them and resting an elbow on the one behind them. He turned his gaze to the field of green expanded before them.

The girl was at a loss for words. Her mouth gaped open as if attempting to speak, but all she accomplished was looking like a fish out of water.

Before anything more could be said, the bell rang signaling the end of classes. The quiet peace that the two students experienced at the bleachers was quickly shattered by the stomping, shouting hoard of teenagers as they flocked to the buses to get home.

Arthur was the first to stand, and he looked down at Amelia with another one of his crooked smiles, "bus or car?"

Amelia blinked, "what?"

"Do you take the bus or get picked up by car?"

"Oh, the bus, why?" The girl stood then, picking up her bag and slinging it over her shoulder. She noticed then that Arthur had no bag himself.

"Because I'm going to walk you if you don't mind."

She felt her cheeks warm up.

"I'll take that as a yes," Arthur laughed, making his way down the bleachers and waiting for her to follow.

It was a good thing she ditched class after all.


End file.
